Gregory Roberts - The Mountain Shadow

‘I guess not, but -’

‘We humans, uniquely, can shape our behaviour with ideas, and feelings, and devotion and art. Things that come from nowhere else but our humanity. We make ourselves, don’t you understand?’

‘There’s plenty of animal nature on display, Idriss,’ I said. ‘I’ve put some of it on display myself.’

‘Of course, our animal nature expresses itself very frequently, and not always pleasantly. Most of the bad news, anywhere, caused by man, is our animal nature, expressing itself without constraint. But the stuff in the arts pages and the science pages of the same newspaper, has more to do with our humane-human nature.’

‘I don’t see a lot of good, where I work.’

‘We can be anything we want to be, including angels. The best that we can do, when we’re determined to do well by one another, is unmatched in the natural world. And when our humane-human selves release our minds from vanity, and greed, we will not only achieve miracles, we’ll be the miracles that we’re destined to be.’

It was a long speech, and as with many of his longer speeches, he ended it with a question.

‘What is your understanding of the difference between Fate and Destiny?’

Fate , Karla once said, and Destiny, his Twin Sister .

‘I just can’t live with the notion that we’re not in control of our own destiny, and that Fate can play with us, like so many toy soldiers.’

‘Fate doesn’t play with us,’ Idriss said, finishing a joint. ‘Fate responds to us.’

‘How?’

He laughed.

It was a day so bright, immaculate heaven so blue, that we were both wearing sunglasses. He couldn’t see my eyes, and I couldn’t see his. It helped, because very often, when I stared into his leaf-brown eyes long enough, I fell like a kid into a creek, and had to think fast to catch up, when a question shook me from the stream.

The students and devotees talked and laughed in the shade, all the chores done for the day. The sky seemed to hover much higher than it usually did, as if there was more space and light.

‘You want to know how Fate works, because you want to fight with Fate, isn’t it?’ Idriss asked. ‘Your instinct is to fight, if you feel yourself under threat. You think that Fate is fighting with you, and you want to gain an advantage in the struggle. Am I right?’

‘I’d like to win in a fair fight, but I get the feeling that Fate cheats.’

‘And how does Fate cheat?’

‘I think Fate and Time have a thing going on. They’re partners in crime.’

‘Definitely,’ he laughed. ‘Fate is another name for Karma, which is another name for Time, which is another name for Love. All of them are names for a tendency field, which permeates the universe. In fact, it’s not too much to say that it is the universe.’

‘A tendency field, Idriss?’

‘A tendency field.’

‘What’s it made of, this tendency field ?’

‘Dark energy, probably, but it’s not what it’s made of that counts. It’s what it is that matters, just as all the atoms that your body is made of are not what you are .’

‘Okay, a dark energy tendency field,’ I said, trying to follow. ‘And what does it do?’

‘The tendency field is what drives the movement toward complexity, and it has done so since the singularity. In that sense, it is the universe. When conscious self-awareness occurs, emerging from sufficient complexity, a link is established between the tendency field and each individual consciousness that engages with it.’

‘What kind of a link?’

‘The tendency field is what responds to our instinct for the Divine. We can’t know the Divine, directly. We can’t directly know the Source of this universe, and its tendency field, and all the other infinite universes like this one, infinitely expanding like flowers and shrivelling again to nothing, and blooming again, in a garden of eternal creation, somewhere in the mind of God. We can’t know that. We don’t even know all there is to know about our own universe, let alone the infinite multiverse, or the Divine that created it. But we can know the tendency field very directly, any time we want.’

‘How?’

Idriss laughed again, and lit another joint.

‘Isn’t it your turn to talk?’

He mocked me gently at least once in every talk: to keep me on my game, perhaps, or to provoke me into a revelation. Every guru, even those who tell you there are no gurus, is an excellent psychologist, skilled in the provocation of truth.

‘I do interrupt a lot, Idriss, and I’m sorry, but only when I don’t understand. Right now, I got it. Please, go ahead.’

‘Very well,’ he said, relaxing again with his feet tucked up beneath him in the canvas chair. ‘Let’s do this thing. At the Big Bang, some characteristics were imparted to the born universe. Space, for example, and time, and matter, and gravitation, all examples of characteristics imparted to the universe by the Big Bang. And the tendency field, which drives the tendency toward complexity, was another of the characteristics imparted at the Big Bang. I also want to say that the set of positive characteristics was imparted to every particle of matter, as well. You’re with me so far?’

‘Space, time, matter, gravitation, classical physics, particle physics, tendency field, positive characteristics, all imparted in the Birth-Bang.’

‘Yes,’ he chuckled. ‘Concisely put. The tendency field operates on a very simple semi-Boolean program – If This, Then That – which runs everything, everywhere. The basic algorithm, if this happens, then that happens , runs everything, including entropy. If it happens that a fully self-aware consciousness arises, then the connection to the tendency field happens.’

‘Doesn’t entropy run counter to complexity?’

‘No. Entropy runs counter to order. And anyway, infinite entropy only applies in a closed system. And with black holes in our universe, leading who knows where, this isn’t a closed system.’

‘Sorry to go back. You mean, no matter what you do in life, good or bad, you can always connect to this tendency field?’

‘If you get in tune with the tendency field, through expanding and exploring the set of positive characteristics within yourself, the tendency field responds with constant energy, and affirmations. If you work against the tendency field, by being negative, unfair, unloving, and unconscious of the truth, you weaken your connection to the tendency field, and you experience existential dread, no matter how rich or famous or powerful you are.’

‘Existential calm, instead of dread? Is that what you’re saying?’

‘If you remain connected to the tendency field, you have serenity. Life is connection, the world is connection, and both are always impoverished by disconnection.’

‘Just about everyone I know, outside of my close friends, has some kind of existential dread. Isn’t it a part of the human condition?’

‘Nothing is a part of the human condition, but our common humanity. A few hundred of us we were, when we began. A few hundred, with no claws or savage teeth but those we cut from the predators that tried to prey upon us. We learned, through cooperation and love, to fear no creature, and no place on land or sea. We are magnificent, and we are malignant. But we can be anything we want ourselves to be, from killers of neighbours, to saviours of distant neighbours in our galaxy. We can shape our destiny. We have the tools. We can -’

A commotion among the students drew the holy man’s attention. We turned to see that Naveen and Diva had arrived on the mountain. They were talking with the small crowd.